Big Ups
1. Yep Roc Records "Fun in the Summer Sun" Sale- One of my favorite means of finding new music is to identify a record label that has put out something I like, then scavenge their website for bands I haven't heard of. I urge you to try this. Set aside about an hour, check out all links, devour every sound clip, and hoard free downloads. If nothing else it should give you some tracks to use on mixes for loved ones. I did this with a small North Carolina-based label, Yep Roc Records, a few months ago, and signed up for their newsletter. This week got an email about a great sale they've got going on: 50 of their best Summer CDs on sale for $10 (+s&h), and they throw in a free sampler of Summer tunes for free. Check it out here; sale ends June 26th. Lots to choose from on the list, much of it Alt-Country. I went with Cities, who sounded like a good honest rock band. If you're at a loss, you can't go wrong with the Apples in Stereo, who are also on the list. Dig!
2. Rolling Stone- De La Soul feature. RS is featuring a track-by-track retrospective on De La Soul's 1993 debut album, 3 Feet High and Rising. I could go on and on and on about the genius and significance of De La, but that would do no justice--just read the piece. One of the most innovative groups in hip-hop, and one of the few crews in that genre to grow and mature like a band. I have mixed feelings about RS covering this album in isolation, since at the time coverage like this made De La Soul feel so pigeonholed as "Rap Hippies" that they moved away from it on their next album, De La Soul is Dead. But, breakthroughs are breakthroughs, and it's great to see magazines doing this type of retrospective coverage that really digs into the music, especially Rolling Stone, which can't be bothered to write about music lately. You'll remember I posted about a similar piece on Nas' Illmatic featured in XXL a few months ago. This is music journalism!
3. Amoeba Music's "Music we Like"- My roommate just came back from a trip to the West Coast, where he paid a visit to one of the best record stores in the country, Amoeba Music. I've only been once: during a drive through L.A. in 2003, we stopped in and I dropped about $80 of my road trip budget on one of the best collections of new and used music I had ever seen. Literally, the money was just pouring out of my pocket, and I walked away with one of the best single-day music hauls in my life. At any rate, my roommate came back from the Amoeba in San Francisco with Amoeba's "Music We Like" guide, a self-published biannual 100 page, 'zine-style guide to their staff's favorite new music and movies. As someone who worked in a music store (Sam Goody! Yes!) this is the kind of power every staffmember covets, and the ultimate testament to Amoeba's independence. If you're in Cali, make it a point to go. If you see someone wearing an Amoeba Music t-shirt, give them a hug.
Big Downs
1. Pearl Jam's Accoustics on Conan- The L.A. Times were all over Pearl Jam's performance on the inaugural Late Show with Conan O'Brien, and the lead-up was definitely compelling. But did anyone else catch the first show last week? The song wasn't horrible, but the acoustics definitely were. Specifically the drums, which sounded like tupperware. Not sure who takes the blame for this one, but somebody's A-game was lacking.
2. Phish is Back- Hide your wares.
3. One-off Festivals- I was checking out the lineups for Lollapaloza and Bonnaroo this week, both of which are formidably awesome. Trust me, no one's happier than me that Lollapalooza still exists. But when I read about these festivals, I get sappy nostalgic for the days when festivals were more than static events where artists come together for a weekend and then disipate. It used to be that bands would sign on for the entire slate of shows, and the festivals would snake through the country like old fashioned circuses, stopping off in your town to raise hell for a weekend and then disappearing into the night. Back then, festivals were really the embodiment of a scene--where artists of all different stripes essentially toured together, and played together week in and week out, in love and hatred (I'm thinking of the infamous Breeders/Pumpkins dynamics from Lollapalooza '94). Nowadays there's no such drama, emotion, or competition--there's no scene--and static festivals reflect it. Now allow me to pour out some liquor in the form of Pavement's "Range Life" video, filmed during Lollapalooza '95. Isn's it glorious:
